Pastor Doug Wilson has written a book called “Mere Christendom. “
This kind of all goes along with Stephen Wolfe’s book, “The Case for Christian Nationalism,” which was recently published by Canon press and advocated for by Wilson.
Scott Aniol has written a review of Wilson’s “Mere Christiandom” in a post called, “A Review of Mere Christendom by Doug Wilson” It was fairly well said and covered all the bases.
So what is this all about? The debate over Christian nationalism. Well actually, in the social media world of Christian Twitter, we are currently celebrating yoga pants season, the modesty debate fight/feast held every spring. I still have my “did King David rape Bathesheba” decorations up, but whatever, time marches on! Yoga pants season will conclude in a few weeks with a Weds night soup potluck before we ritualistically move on to the next season of recurring and redundant debates.
While I was attempting to avoid watching the recent English coronation of King Charles, I did catch a few glimpses of it in memes and photos. My first thought was, so is this Christian nationalism?? Because if so, I want no part of this! In fact, some of my ancestors laid down their very lives to get us out from under this kind of regime.
You’ll have to forgive me, the Angelican church, the Church of England, all the way across the waters to the alleged Catholic faith of the current US President has made my life very confusing. Here in what I call the 9th circuit of hell, we also have a kind of “Christian nationalism” going on. It just so happens to be very woke and very liberal Christian nationalism, but the rules are still the same. Comply or be roasted.
No thank you.
Never mind what “Christian nationalism” might actually look like in practice, half the time I don’t even know what a “Christian” looks like! Well, actually I do, I have a good feel for that sort of thing, I am just saying that while President Biden and King Charles are said to be Christians and given worldly credentials and everything, I happen to have a good two dozen emails proclaiming myself to be a heretic, unsaved and unsavory to boot.
Alas, when we do usher in this, “Mere Christendom” I surely won’t be the one running things. That’s a bigger loss to y’all than it is to me, I am just saying those in charge of the “new” Christian Nationalism are going to be exactly like who we see in charge of it right now! President Biden, King Charles, the World Economic Forum, and assorted other incompetent and/or malevolent “Christian” characters.
“Meet the new boss, same as the old boss, stuck in the middle with you…“
Heck, I recently read a charming tweet from someone claiming to be a Christian who seems to believe that those who wear yoga pants and “lead their brothers to sin,” should be raped and dismembered. No word yet on which gender was wearing the yoga pants that so tempted and offended him, but on general principle alone I am totally opposed to dismembering people.
It’s darkly humorous and sometimes downright terrifying how many people seem to conflate “discipling nations” with “disciplining nations.” To disciple means “to teach.” A disciple is one who is being taught. A disciple is NOT one who doles out punishment.
Apparently there is a great deal of confusion over this one little point and I’m afraid it is just a huge deal breaker. I cannot possibly get behind anyone who doesn’t seem to know the difference. The Bible is pretty clear, “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.”
Most of us humans have not been perfected in love, therefore power, control, fear, and punishment, pretty much rule the day, all things we are often taught from childhood and are now deeply ingrained.
I even strongly disagree with Scott Aniol when he says, “Jesus does want a theocracy. And he will get what he wants, when he comes again in glory to judge the living and the dead. And it won’t be mere Christendom—it will be totalitarian, rule-with-a-rod-of iron theocracy.”
No! That is what recreating God in our own image looks like, a totalitarian theocracy ruled with an iron fist by an egotistical dictator. Nope, that is so not the God I know, not even close, but it sure fits the bill for assorted tyrants and bullies all throughout human history, who thought they were gods.
Accept no substitutes.
I am a Christian, a patriot, and even a nationalist, so in theory “Christian nationalism” is sort of my natural inclination. It sounds like a delightful utopian vision, with lots of shared values, a love for our neighbors, and everyone singing kumbaya. However without fail the Lord just keeps showing me over and over again, see, this is why you can’t have nice things.
See, there's this thing called biology... 
You will know them by their fruit which is love , peace, kindness, goodness, patience, self control etc etc . God’s attributes.
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Absolutely! Good point. We also start to resemble those we spend a lot of time with, we begin to take on their characteristics. You can’t go wrong spending time with Jesus.
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“I am a Christian, a patriot, and even a nationalist, so in theory “Christian nationalism” is sort of my natural inclination.”
It’s just so uncanny how you say these things that resonate with me. Or write them, I mean. I’m a Christian, because I believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and, I’m a nationalist, because I love my nation, and believe in its continued existence, and hope and pray that God blesses it and protects it and forgives it and disciples it so that He doesn’t need to harshly discipline it, but, I can’t help but think that “Christian Nationalist” as promulgated by the likes of Teddy Spaghetti, for example, is about as oxymoronic as an oxymoron can get. People are Christians, not nations, even if the king is a Christian, even if a nation is populated 100% by Christians. Seems to me it’s a category error, a confusion of terms, a mixing of the metaphorical functions, or something like that.
Also, it has to mean something that Revelation 20:8 tells us that after 1,000 years of direct rule by Jesus Christ the devil is able to convince vast hordes, apparently the majority of humanity alive at the time, to rebel against Him and the only remedy God has is to consume them all with fire from heaven. So, the point would seem to be that even a Christian Planet led by Jesus Christ Himself is not sufficient to save most people.
Revelation 20
7 And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison,
8 And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea.
9 And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them.
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I’m glad this resonated with you.
I’ve been studying Dr Micheal Heiser, who made a documentary and wrote a book called, “The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible.” I don’t begin to understand it all, but he has a some interesting stuff about the supernatural war we are in, the one we can’t really see where different spiritual entities attempt to control or influence nations and territories. We see this all throughout the Bible, much of it is made evident to us, but we don’t always understand the difference between what is happening in the natural world versus the spiritual world.
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The name Doug Wilson sort of”rings a bell”; you might want to obtain a book titled Angels: Gods secret agents, by Billy Graham. I had a copy since my mid twenties, gave it to a Polish security officer I’d worked with; he was leaving town and I knew we’d never meet again. It, Image is of the one I owned, and a larger book, Links below, are available at Amazon:
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Thank you, Partnering.
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Discipline and disciple have the same entomology. Consequently, they cannot have two different meanings. Discipline does not mean passing judgement. Discipline means behavior ordered toward some good end.
The Christian disciple’s behavior is ordered toward the Word of God.
Believe me, the human being who chooses to order their behavior toward the Word of God, has a tough row to hoe because God demands a discipline beyond human capability.
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Yes, I think I agree with you, Silence. God does demand a discipline beyond human capability, which is why He does not leave us to accomplish it on our own. Perhaps making these things beyond our human capability is deliberate, to help draw us to Him in the first place.
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I think it is to make us humble. Humility is the opposite of pride. Humility is what Jesus looked like.
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This is me… being so freaking tired of the Lefties pushing the idea that christians want to take over the world politically with “Christian Nationalism” Sheesh!!! And the… we as christians feeding into that garbage by publishing books on either why it’s “just not true” (as if we should have to say this even to ourselves) or books or pubs embracing such garbage and without a shred of self awareness defending why it would be a “good thing”. “my kingdom is not of this world, if it were my followers would fight for me”. the whole narrative of “Christian Nationalism” is a Meme of the Lefties to drum up more fear and hatred for Christians. it’s a way they further marginalize and demonize us. Stop feeding the monster that wants to kill us. Sorry, rant over
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LOL! Feel free to rant away.
I’ve always believed that the best way to “make things go away” is to simply talk about them. Drag them out in the sunlight or into the Son-light if you prefer. This can seem kind of counter intuitive, but most of the things that afflict us are tucked away in the back of the closet or avoided and stuffed under the bed somewhere.
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It’s a false narrative that needs to die by ignoring it. But we keep it alive and growing by continuing to banter it about, whether in support or disagreement. There is no need to keep addressing a narrative that isn’t True. You just keep it alive.
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The things we avoid discussing don’t actually go away, often they grow even bigger and more powerful.
It is also not actually a “false narrative” for lefties to accuse people of wanting to force Christian nationalism on the country when in fact we have numerous Christians saying exactly that publicly, and even writing books about it. A false narrative is something that has no basis in fact. This one has a basis and is an accurate reflection of current reality.
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Mirror Christianity. No there’s a thought. So little is reflected right? The candle under the bushel thing. May keep me warm, and out of sight, but no benefit to others.
Too bad though that’s it’s considered ‘mere,’ as if a trifle. Didn’t Clive Staples (Jack Lewis) say much more? Yep.
I do like your idea though that a disciple does not mete out 40 lashes. An ambassador goes to a foreign country NOT to meddle or change their laws, but to represent his own country. Back to the mirror thing. Prob. not a good idea to force our image.
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It is a tiny bit offensive that this book rifts off of CS Lewis who wrote such wonderful words, including “Mere Christianity,” and said quite clearly that, “theocracy is the worst of all possible governments” and “of all bad men, religious bad men are the worst.”
You are spot on about the mirror, Colorstorm. One of my favorite passages is, “…Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much: but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little.” Grace is so reflective, we can’t help but give away what we ourselves have received.
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Religious bad men are the worst. Ouch. Truth hurts right? We could think of ten thousand who wear soft clothes with forked tongues.
Most excellent reply. Tkx.
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The problem with “Theocracy” is that it is by definition a Totalitarian structure, like Communism and Fascism, which combine social and economic elements that need to be independent of each other. It seems much better if the Theologians are like the proverbial Peanut Gallery of olde that can criticize and heckle and shame from the mezzanine but have no actual police power themselves. And then the Theologians can campaign and influence the populace to consider the ways of the political class and cast proper judgement upon them according to objective moral principles. It’s a separation and delegation of powers thing. Seems to me a true “Christian Nation” would take the need for separating the delegated powers in to account when concocting their Constitutional framework.
Strangely, most of the Christian nationalists I know who consider this aspect do not call themselves “Christian Nationalists.”
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Doug addresses Scott’s review in his May 10 post. It essentially comes down to this: There is no biblical limitation on the spread of the gospel, and all sorts of indication it will grow and cover the whole earth. So…what if God actually sent a revival? A big one. Like Ninevah to the Ninavah power, and whose believers are faithful for generations not just for a few decades? Do we staff the government with Christians doing Christian things or do we look for the “wise Turk” to lead the masses of believers? In the first case you have the church catholic discipling christians including telling christians (and adjacent unbelievers) the limitations of their power…its in scripture somewhere. Welcome to Christendom 2.0. Rome did it poorly. The COE is doing it unfaithfully, but if you have a lot of christians, then there will be some sort of Christendom. How about one that does it faithfully and better.
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So I have read Wilson’s response and what I still object to is the implication of implied force. He uses words and phrases like “enacted, caught, hammered out.”
Wilson also seems to believe his job is, “teaching them to obey everything Christ had commanded us.” I mentioned yoga pants and the David and Bathsheba debates with a bit of snark on account of the fact that these routinely become heated and nasty debates all across social media. So who gets to define and decide what it means to obey everything Christ has commanded us??
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“Render unto God that which is His; render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s”… Doesn’t that make Christian nationalism something of an oxymorom?
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Yes, it kind of does!
James Madison once wrote about separation of church and state, that both exist in greater purity the more they are kept apart. When we open the door between church and state, we forget it is a two way door. It is not so much that the presence of Christians taints government, but rather that power, control, and social influence tends to come back in and taint the church.
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Amen! The institutional goals differ to a degreee, but the DNA of the operators does not …
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I think that ‘Christian Nationalism’ is just another brand-name for ‘Alt-Right.’ They’re really not Conservatives (and Christian is a dubious designation too) but Reactionary Leftists. They basically just want to substitute their own people and ideologies for the existing Liberal paradigm without making any fundamental changes.
The debates they have over sleeveless dresses and yoga pants show that they’re a bunch of latent homos on top of all of their other crimes. When they talk about women on most of the Manosphere blogs they either sound like a bunch of jealous gay guys or fake pick-up artists who only want women around to be their ‘beards.’
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I really believe God made us and pronounced us good. Then He said to be fruitful and multiply. So human sexuality and attraction to the opposite sex is healthy, natural, and good. These yoga pants and sleeve debates while annoying and sometimes hurtful to women, are ultimately deeply psychologically and sexually abusive towards men. The whole “toxic masculinity” thing coming from feminists and the left is the exact same message coming from these religious guys, it’s the implication that normal, healthy sexual attraction is sinful, shameful, and toxic.
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That’s exactly the line that these Red Pills took when they hijacked the Men’s Rights Movement: live down to negative Feminist stereotypes and use the same ‘narratives.’ Heck during ‘Gamergate’ and their attempts to take over comics and sci-fi, they weren’t worried about lack of competition: they wanted to leave the same monopoly in place—just put in their own speech codes and political correctness (like DeSantis is doing with Disney). It’s been the same pattern with the Alt-Right/Christian Nationalism. They aren’t promoting more freedom: they want the same power structure that the Left has.
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